Rasplex no sound on E-AC-3 unless trancode

Dev Community Apps & Creations
1

Guys,

I have been working fine with a synology NAS running Plex server and PII client (latest version), all films and TV play fine with 5.1 DTS. Lately Certain TV shows play no sound, the only way around this is to turn transcoding on the PII, which although I get sound I have to wait and the show pauses.

The only thing I can see is that in the MKV the Audio is E-AC-3, as opposed to a know good file which is AC-3.

Thanks in advance

2

Need rPi model and OpenPHT client version number before we can help.

3

Sorry it is a PI 2 with rasplex 1.7.1

4

Do you know what your TV/Audio source supports? The rPi supports audio transcoding to AAC PCM and AC3 directly on the rPi. Can you run the audio service command via SSH and post the results in this thread? That will tell us what audio settings you should use.

tvservice -a

You can look at this document for reference instructions as well.

/uploads/default/original/3X/7/a/7a2c87e7616abe8311dd0f80318fdc65b7f322d0.pdf

5

guys,

I have all audio setup as it should be, all mkvā€™s play fine, my problem seems to be specific to E-AC-3, my amp doesnā€™t support it, I have tried checking and unchecking the Enhanced E-AC-3 but I get no sound on mkvā€™s with E-AC-3, the only way to get sound is to allow transcoded which stutters and pauses (Synology DS216+II). All these MKVā€™s are Amazon Prime videos so it look like I will need to find another source or remux the mkvā€™s to plain old AC-3.

George

6

@georgestark said:
guys,

I have all audio setup as it should be, all mkvā€™s play fine, my problem seems to be specific to E-AC-3, my amp doesnā€™t support it, I have tried checking and unchecking the Enhanced E-AC-3 but I get no sound on mkvā€™s with E-AC-3, the only way to get sound is to allow transcoded which stutters and pauses (Synology DS216+II). All these MKVā€™s are Amazon Prime videos so it look like I will need to find another source or remux the mkvā€™s to plain old AC-3.

George

Can you list out what your audio settings you have right now? and can you list what the results of running the following command in SSH:

tvservice -a

7

Ben,

Please see below:
FRRasPlex:~ # tvservice -a
PCM supported: Max channels: 8, Max samplerate: 96kHz, Max samplesize 24 bits.
AC3 supported: Max channels: 6, Max samplerate: 48kHz, Max rate 640 kb/s.
DTS supported: Max channels: 6, Max samplerate: 48kHz, Max rate 1536 kb/s.
I have tried with DTS + enabled and disabled, by setting are the following:

Audio output device HDMI
Number of channels 5.1 (or 7.1 if you have sufļ¬cient speakers) Support 8 channel DTS-HD audio decoding Unchecked
Enable passthrough Checked
Dolby Digital (AC3) capable receiver Checked
Dolby Digital Plus (E-AC3) capable receiver Unchecked/and tried checked
DTS capable receiver Checked

8

The way I have been fixing this is:
use MKVMerge to remove all except the E-AC3 track
use bigsoft Audio converter to remix E-AC3 tram to AC-3
use MKVMerge on original, remove E-AC3 track and add new AC-3 Track

apain in the ass but the only way I can see to do it.

P.S I have the same issue on a Samsung Smart TVā€¦
P.P.S the above is the quickest way, remixing the whole MKV (video and all take to long)

9

series effected Sneak Pete and The grand tour, so far

10

anyone had this issue?

11

I think I may be alone in hereā€¦

anyaway is there any setting for Plex/raplex that can direct play the video but transcoded the audio?

This might be a fix for me?

Hello, helloā€¦

12

I have exactly the same issue running on 1.7.1. E-AC3 tracks are not playing (at all). Iā€™ve setup passthrough for AC3 and DTS and that works great. As my receiver doesnā€™t support E-AC3 Iā€™ve unchecked that setting.

RasPlex:~ # tvservice -a
     PCM supported: Max channels: 2, Max samplerate: 192kHz, Max samplesize 24 bits.
     AC3 supported: Max channels: 6, Max samplerate:  48kHz, Max rate  640 kb/s.
     DTS supported: Max channels: 7, Max samplerate:  48kHz, Max rate 1536 kb/s.
13

marc,
Itā€™s a pain, you have to remux the MKVā€™s down to AC-3, unless someone else can help?

14

@georgestark said:
marc,
Itā€™s a pain, you have to remux the MKVā€™s down to AC-3, unless someone else can help?

Thanks, hopefully this will be addressed soon!

15

I have same issue too I think

16

This is going to become more of an issues as more films/TV have E-ac3

17

As there is no solution yet for the lack of sound with eac3 tracks Iā€™ve looked for an easy solution to remux movies. And itā€™s actually quite easy. Hereā€™s how I do it on a RPI running raspbian.

Preparations
Download eac3toac3 > https://github.com/samirfor/eac3toac3
Install mkvtools > sudo apt-get install mkvtoolnix

Extract the EAC3 track and remux to AC3
./eac3toac3.sh source.mkv

Place the AC3 track into the MKV (removes the EAC3 track)
mkvmerge -o newfile.mkv source.mkv source.ac3

Remove the original MKV that contains the EAC3 track
mv newfile.mkv source.mkv

Remove extracted and converted audio files
rm source.ac3 source.eac3

The last 3 steps can also easily be added to a custom bash script so you only have to run 1 single command.

18

marc,

Amazing, I am running Plex Server on a sinology NAS, and have little experience installing app, et. from the cli, do you have a step by step dummies guide on how to achieve the abov?

George

19

Change Number of channels to 2.0 (number of PCM channels) and after that select Enable Dolby Digital (AC3) transcoding

1 Like
20

Kwiboo,

Will I need to change it back when I want to play dts or Dolby digital 5.1 films/TV?